Oman’s journey for 2023 World Cup berth begins in Scotland

The national cricket team and its support staff, along with Oman Cricket (OC) officials, after receiving cash awards from OC board members and representative of Khimji Ramdas Group at Amerat recently. The team was honoured on attaining the maiden ODI status in Namibia last month

Muscat Daily staff writer

May 12, 2019

Oman's journey for a dream spot in the 2023 Cricket World Cup will begin in right earnest this August when it takes part in the first of the 21 tri-series to be played among seven nations in the ICC Men's Cricket World Cup League 2 in Scotland from August 14.

Oman (No 17) is among the seven nations, which are ranked from 14-20 until January 2022, and will play a total of 36 ODIs each with three World Cup

Qualifier 2022 places up for grabs on the Road to India 2023.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) last week announced the schedule for the first eight series of the World Cricket League 2. Oman will be joined by Namibia, Nepal, Papua New Guinea (PNG), Scotland, UAE and US in the fray.

Oman, Namibia, US and PNG had recently attained ODI status after finishing as top-four teams at the ICC World Cricket League Division Two.

The nations will be playing against each other from August to January 2022 with teams just two steps away from the World Cup. The league will have a total of 126 ODIs played across the seven nations.

Besides hosts Scotland and Oman, PNG will be the third team in the first series taking place in Aberdeen.

Each series will see teams play a total of six ODIs with teams competing for the three top spots in the league, which will confirm their place in the Cricket World Cup Qualifier 2022.

The bottom four teams will drop into the World Cup Qualifier playoff, which is a repechage event to the qualifier and will be joined by the winner of Challenge League A and B. The top-two from the playoff will keep their hopes alive of World Cup spot.

This is the first time in cricket’s history 20 teams will have ODI status providing more opportunity for ODI cricket both in ICC events and in member-organised bilateral cricket.

Oman will host the fourth of the 21 tri-series at Amerat from January 6-13, 2020. Namibia and UAE will join Oman in the tri-series, to be played at Amerat.

In his remarks to the ICC website, Pankaj Khimji, Oman Cricket board member, said, “The opportunities that have come out of qualifying for League 2 are huge. We hope to meet the expectations of ICC in terms of performance we put in and in terms of our preparations. For the next 30 months, we will make ODI status something that everyone will be happy about and to see Oman perform at the highest level.”